Dysfunction
by SofterSoftest
Summary: ("Love is a sacrament that should be taken kneeling."- O.W.)


("Love is a sacrament that should be taken kneeling."- O.W.)

He wakes near midnight, once the sunlight has snubbed itself out yet the city stays alive and singing just beyond the brick of his apartment building.

It's not the noise that wakes him.

In the handful of months Olaf has lived in his dingy flat, the outside noise has only ever been a welcome bustle, a consequence. Not worth losing sleep. It's not the television, flickering in the low light with half an antenna, volume so low it's barely a whisper, lest the programs warp in his ears to his mother's voice while he sleeps.

And, for once, it's not the dreams. Horrid things, nightmares, though he hates to think that word, hates how it summons an image of childhood, of night terrors, of fearing any shadowed spot his eyes couldn't fathom. The last dream had been inconsequential enough, some panic-inducing vision where he picks his teeth after a meal and they fall out into his lap, one after the other, some still dangling on their stringy roots, twisting when his lips touched or when he moved to collect the teeth in his lap like coins on the ground.

He woke tonguing his teeth after that, his heart rapid and high, yet relieved that his nightmare had been absent of fire or family or any other well-worn traumas.

As his eyes adjust to the dim overhead lights, yellowed from years of smoking tenants before him, Olaf tries to recall any dreams and finds his mind blank of them. This is a small victory after months of repetitive terrors, yet he finds himself annoyed, frustrated, awake without cause.

He sits up from the ratty couch that is his bed, swings his legs to the floor. The stained, cluttered coffee table before him is still brimming with junk- a stack of his favorite records has tipped and fallen to the floor amidst piles of mail, scripts, and takeout containers long emptied. His eyes catch on one particular magazine stolen from his neighbor's doorstep, a pretty blonde model on the cover beneath the title: HOW TO MAKE DYSFUNCTIONAL LOVE LAST FOREVER. He hasn't read it, won't read it, but he likes throwing it around if only to see the woman's face warp and crinkle.

Everything is as he left it.

Then, from the street two stories down, a man's voice.

"Come _on_! They're playing live music up the street! I'll buy the next round, just one more place, let's-" He's cut off by acquiescing laughter and the rumble of other voices as they pass below Olaf's window and further into the city.

The window is open.

This is where understanding dawns, where his heart kicks, where he sits, suddenly, very still. Olaf grins to himself, flexes his fingers, wonders how he hadn't sensed it before. He thinks perhaps he's grown used to it- that electric buzz of intuition, of sensate warning, of knowing without truly knowing that something is very wrong.

He stands, still grinning, knowing better. It had only taken a minute. Intuition woke him in the dead of sleep, kept him aware enough to see, to _see_.

Without turning towards the deeper darkness of his apartment, he glances over his body, his pallid shirtlessness and loose pinstripe pants, calls, voice deep with sleep, "You're lucky I'm not nude. What's a young girl like you doing, sneaking into a man's apartment in the middle of the night? Didn't Beatrice teach you any manners?"

It's enough.

There's a moment of hesitation, of dread, and then she breaks. From deep within the kitchen, a scuffle, a bang. Olaf turns, sees the top of her head, sees the moment she slips against the trash on the floor and crashes into his kitchen table, sees a half-empty bottle of wine tip and shatter to the floor. Their eyes meet for a moment, hers shining wet like an animal's in the dim, before she tries to right herself, still so obviously and uselessly hoping at escape. When she stomps atop the glass and wine, it is enough to send her feet out from under her.

Violet hits the floor hard, the air leaving her lungs, a pitiful clash and quiet.

Olaf can feel cool wind on his back from the window. He rounds the couch, walks over with metered ease, and stands too close, watching as her hands flutter at her chest, her neck, red wine dripping down her arms. She cannot catch her breath.

"You're later than normal." He says with a grin, delighting in the way her eyes find his in alarm. He can tell she's wondering how long he's known, weighing it against the timeline of her beginning, whenever she first started infiltrating his apartment during his absences, touching nothing, stealing nothing.

 _I know who you are_ , he almost says- useless, repetitive. Instead, he asks softly, "Have your parents warned you about me? Had to see the villain for yourself?"

She still can't quite breathe, a testament to her panic and how hard she must have fallen. Among the glass and the red wine, he can't tell if she's bleeding but he doesn't particularly care. She looks beautiful in the dim, gasping, red-faced with humiliation, so close and utterly terrified. She's wheezing now, shallow breaths, far too short to help.

 _When did you start spying on me?_ He always thought to ask, the moment he actually caught her. _Who sent you?_

With Violet Baudelaire at his feet, however, he finds he doesn't want to know.

Smug with victory, Olaf reaches out, brushes a hand along the curve of her jaw. In her lap, her hands are damp, stained, useless. She does not push him away, only stares helpless and trapped.

"You really are pretty," he sneers, thumbing the swell of her bottom lip, back and forth, rolling it.

He wants to disgust her, wants to see her cry, wants revenge.

His thumb slips past her mouth. Her tongue spasms beneath his touch as he presses down on impulse, lingers. Violet gasps, goes still, her breathing shallow but better, faster.

She doesn't bite him. To Olaf, this feels like a gift, yet, as the seconds drag, also very, very telling.

"You wanted me to find you, didn't you?" He asks, quiet, stepping slightly closer as he tips her chin, makes her look at him. "Wanted me to see you."

Finally, Violet spits him out, her damp little hands scrabbling at his wrist. She lurches to her feet, nearly slips again, and Olaf lets her, lets her flee past him while she drips wine across the place, while he clenches his fists, his wet thumb hot and burning in the center of his palm.

He watches her leap out the window without a backwards glance, clattering to the small roof of the neighbors below him, hears the clang of her boots on their fire escape.

As soon as he had found her, she's gone, not one answered question between them, as if the press of his thumb on her tongue had well and truly silenced her.

Olaf stares at the wine on the floor, the deep glint of the shattered green glass, and wonders who she'll tell, what she'll say, what else she wants.

What her voice sounds like. If she'll be back.

The wine stays on the floor. He returns to the couch, wondering if he'll dream, if he'll see her there too, showing up where she's not allowed. To watch what happens, never interacting, always above and beyond and too far to touch.

Midnight fades to early morning.

He leaves the window open.


End file.
